culture
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Don’t Talk About Ferguson or Michael Brown, School District Says
Superintendent Ed Hightower of Illinois’ Edwardsville School District has told schools not to talk about Michael Brown. According to KMOX News, Hightower told the station that although current news is typically discussed in class, “this situation in Ferguson-Florissant has become a situation whereby there are so many facts that are unknown.” If students bring up…
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USC Football Captain Admits Lying About Heroic Story
Update 6:56 p.m. USC football captain Josh Captain now says he made it all up, according to ESPN.com. That story about saving his drowning nephew by jumping out a second story window is just that; a story. There’s no explanation for what the young man was thinking in telling this tale, or how he really…
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Company Man and Wife: Couple Sells Ad Space to Sponsor Wedding
Courtney McKenzie and her fiance, Jamil Newell, are under no illusion about the high cost of a destination wedding, so the couple have come up with a creative way to cover the expense: have corporations sponsor it. The Orlando, Fla., couple are all set to wed in December and are hoping that they get enough…
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Squatters on the Rise in Cash-Strapped Detroit
Water is not the only thing that’s becoming hard to come by in Detroit. With joblessness on the rise in a city that has already claimed bankruptcy, squatting—or staking claim to property that has been abandoned or a former owner can no longer afford—is increasing. According to an Al-Jazeera news report, 27-year-old John Deboer is…
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Family Calls Assault in Baltimore a Hate Crime
Police have a 19-year-old in custody as the main suspect in two violent incidents last week in the Baltimore neighborhood of Otterbein, WJZ reports. Within the span of a week in the neighborhood, there have been three attacks, with at least one victim needing surgery for his injuries. A 25-year-old victim, who has remained unidentified,…
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My Friends’ Colorism Is Affecting My Baby’s Facebook Likes!
Saw your response to racist comments posted online, but what about this? I’m trying my best not to be petty here, while I’m aware this is going to sound petty no matter how I put it. I believe my friends’ and family’s internalized racism and colorism is affecting their responses to photos of my child.…
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Picture This: We Don’t All Look Alike
The idea is this: Once you reach status—legendary-Hollywood-superstar status—the rules change. Somehow you are legitimized, devoid of disrespect, a household name. The tropes should not fit anymore, and slights should fall casually outside your perimeter. That is the black-American-success dream of assimilating without changing who you are; that somehow, in your legitimate work, you are,…
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Belle: A Film That Defied Expectations
Actress Gugu Mbatha-Raw, who stars in the movie Belle—now out on DVD—grew up in England watching Jane Austen films but never imagined that she would play the lead in a period drama. Those films, like the books they were based on, never had black or biracial heroines, but Belle does. The film was inspired by…
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Chicago Cop Kills Teen, Sparking Protests
Protesters congregated on Chicago’s West Side on Monday after the fatal shooting of 19-year-old Roshad McIntosh, who was gunned down by law enforcement on Sunday, DNAinfo Chicago reports. Officers were responding to a call regarding armed men when they encountered McIntosh, who allegedly started to run when they tried to speak to him. Law enforcement…
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Rastafarian Teen in Louisiana Turned Away From School Over His Dreadlocks
A Louisiana teen who is a Rastafarian has missed almost every day of school since the start of the new semester because of the length of his locks, the Raw Story reports. According to the report, the young boy went to school on Aug. 8, when classes resumed, but was sent home because his hair…